This lecture will take place in the Belmont Chapel at Island Cemetery. February 12 and 15 (snow dates 2/19, 2/22)
In season 3 of The Gilded Age television series, Gladys Russell is basically forced into marrying an English duke to enhance the Russell family’s social standing and to provide funds for the duke’s grand English estate. This practice was common in Gilded Age America. The lecture will share the stories of some of the more than three dozen women with Newport connections who married foreign aristocrats. (image is from HBO Gilded Age)
According to a book called Titled Americans (1915), there were 454 marriages between Gilded Age and Progressive Era American women and European aristocrats, most of whom were Britons. The Library of Congress noted in a reference guide that "American heiresses married more than a third of the House of Lords". Between 1870 and 1914, 102 British aristocrats, six of whom were dukes, married American women.